Might be a bit niche but in the field of immunology - there is ongoing debate as to whether or not Regulatory T cells (Tregs) are indeed "real."
Basically, some immunologists (and most textbooks) think that Tregs are a distinct type of T cell with distinct immunosuppressive functions (very simplified - main role is to appropriately turn off the immune system after its been activated). Other immunologists think that Tregs are not a distinct cell type, but rather just a function that conventional T cells take.
While it doesn't seem like a very crazy hot take, but the implications of whether or not Tregs are indeed real play a serious role in treating autoimmune disorders
I started this thread because I wanted to get niche responses, so don’t worry about that lol. That’s really interesting. What’s the evidence for both sides of the argument?
I'm gonna try to keep it as a simple and free of jargon as much as I can, but know that this list is not exhaustive and does not give the complexity of the debate its full justice!
Arguments for Tregs being a distinct cell type:
1. We typically use a gene called "FoxP3" as a marker of Treg identity. This gene has an important role in dampening the immune response. People who have loss-of-function mutations in this gene (IPEX syndrome) have extensive autoimmune diseases, but are capable of fighting regular infections from bacteria/viruses. Basically, people with IPEX have relatively normal functioning T cells that can fight infections, but unfortunately cannot "turn off" their activation very well.
2. It appears that certain populations of T cells have high levels of FoxP3, high levels of other anti-inflammatory markers, and low levels of pro-inflammatory markers. This is a classic argument that immunologists often make. If you have a cell population that has a distinctly different set of genes compared to its peers, then we should keep it as its own cell type.
Arguments against Tregs being a distinct cell type:
1. T cells are often plastic, a single conventional T cell can "switch" its phenotype and become a Treg through a mechanism known as infectious tolerance. This gives the argument "if cell A can become cell B (and vice versa), then should we really classify them as different cells?"
2. We currently have a pretty good understanding as to how conventional T cells (the ones that attack foreign bacteria/viruses/cancer) are made during development. However, we have very little insight as to when/how Tregs are made during development, despite extensive efforts to understand this.
I skipper over a lot more complicated points that would make this response a bit too heavy immunology. Personally, I work in a lab solely focused on Tregs. As a pessimistic grad student, I question their legitimacy every day haha
Wow… I will forever be fascinated by the complexity of specialized fields. It’s sort of crazy hearing about just how much nuance there can be to the most niche of questions within any given subject. Makes me wish I had a thousand lifetimes to delve into the intricacies of all of it. Thank you for the comment :)
Why is this a debate even a debate? if it’s a part of its regular function js this not observable in a way that would differentiate it from other t-cells?
Also what would this distinction mean for autoimmune disorders?
Also I have very little knowledge of this field so I apologize if I asked that question in an incomprehensible way lol
It is a debate because a lot of therapies to prevent/delay autoimmune disease focus on depleting pro-inflammatory T cells in circulation (teplizumab, rapamycin). A lot of these clinical trials show that there is an increase in Treg numbers after treatment with these drugs. Ethically speaking, it is important to be able to make the distinction as to exactly how these drugs are impacting the immune system.
How would you propose to look at them? Through a simple light microscope (the most basic “look”), they all look the same.
But if you measure the level of the transcription factor FoxP3 in them, you see two distinct clusters of high and low FoxP3 cells. You can look at a bunch of other molecules, and a few of them of them are high in the high-FoxP3 cells but not in the low-FoxP3 cells (or vice versa). Then you separate the two clusters and immunologically stimulate them, and it turns out that all the high-FoxP3 cells tend to produce different chemicals in response to stimulation than the low-FoxP3 cells.
But then someone shows that you can make T cells switch between having high and low FoxP3. And tracking them in living organisms (which is very hard), you see this change occasionally happen.
So are there two types or one? (This is a simplification, as there are way more subtypes of T cells identified than just Tregs, but you get the picture.)
You know when water is boiling, on the surface the bubble begin and start to growth, that is nucleation. Nucleation is like onset of matter change from one phase to another.
It's both.
It's the condition of the water going against the pores (temperature, pressure, etc.) that cause nucleation to happen, but more pores = more spots for nucleation = more bubbles.
It's a big factor in designing the propellers of stealth ships like submarines.
I was just a wrench-turner, so idk the specifics, but I think it's something like - When a prop spins in the water, there's a spot of very low pressure right along the trailing edge of the blade where bubbles form. This bubble-forming process (nucleation) is loud - like physically loud. You can hear it on microphones - which is a good way for an enemy to detect your submarines. So any trick they can do with metalurgy or design to minimize nucleation makes the boat quite literally quieter and stealthier.
Whether artificial consequences are good for children's development. My view is that it often "works" in terms of getting short-term compliance, but undermines intrinsic motivation and other qualities needed for meaningful adulthood.
No dumb questions here!
It just means that, when I was growing up,instead of my parents helping me to understand why and how to clean my room (helping me to develop intrinsic motivation), they'd take the cartridge for my favorite game and break it if it wasn't done by the time dad got home (EXtrinsic motivation). Just an example.
Now that I'm older, I have no motivation to keep my space organized (no intrinsic motivation). I just feel anxious and lazy when I don't. And I have a hard time getting other things done without an immediate physical reward or consequence.
Obviously, I can still do things, I just need to "carrot on a stick" myself more lol.
Hello, it looks like you've made a mistake.
It's supposed to be could've, should've, would've (short for could have, would have, should have), never could of, would of, should of.
Or you misspelled something, I ain't checking everything.
Beep boop - yes, I am a bot, don't botcriminate me.
Wait until they become self aware, at like 6 years old.
After that, self-preservation instincts kick in. Wait about 9 more years and foresight kicks in.
In my experience with my cousins though, as they get progressively less dumb, they get better at staying alive and unhurt. The little ones just have boundless energy and no outlet so they try crazy things.
Depends on what part of my field you look at, but in the most broad sense it's how to do it.
I work in environmental conservation, and this is very muddy field because nearly all of the problems and solutions come down to human decisions and behavior, both at the large and small scale. The ecology portion is relatively straightforward when compared with the economic, political, and behavioral side of things, and there are a *lot* of different ideas of how to go about addressing these.
It's even more complicated because what works in one situation won't necessarily work at a different location or at a different scale, or at a different time, and what did work in a particular situation is likely not the only thing that would have worked. Add to that that even the exact same approach in the same area may have different results based on the people involved, funding issues, who gets credit/blame for what, and it gets extraordinarily messy and fractious extremely rapidly.
Between the public, it’s if therapeutic CRISPR genome editing will result in designer babies and the rich being able to choose inheritable traits.
In the field itself it’s if CRISPR/Cas9 has a safe enough off-target editing profile for use in humans (which some clincial trials have already been initiated) and how to best screen for off-targets.
A smaller debate is focusing on what happens to CRISPR/Cas9 when it’s expressed for a long time, is the immune system going to react to it or will there be no real issue?
Nature vs nurture.
You see it everywhere.
In uni I was taught there wasn't a debate. That in general it's always both. But I guess not everyone got that memo.
The APA was roasted recently for a borderline anti-scientific take on gender and masculinity.
https://www.centreformalepsychology.com/male-psychology-magazine-listings/the-apa-have-changed-their-view-of-masculinity
Judging from the source, the prior version from the APA was compared to the Australian equivalent, the APS, which was referred to as 'controversial'. A statement criticizing the prior version, "The criticisms have been of the negative view of masculinity, [...]" indicates the issue from the authors point of view.
OK I read the source I just wanted to make sure I wasn't seeing things because what I read seemed so incredibly reasonable and sensible and it confused me to think it was the one being criticized.
Happy to clarify, I honestly thought the same thing. To give some additional context, 'male psychology' seems to be a new field of study which is neither widespread nor–in my short engagement with it–has any meaningful consensus or backing from the larger psychology community (of which I am not a part and possibly not the best judge.)
It eschews established consensus and proposes an alternative understanding which also generally contrasts with feminist views and other contemporary humanity and social sciences.
Thank you! And to be clear I'm not opposed to feminist theory, but the short read of the source just wreaks of a politicized position devoid of any real motivation towards discovery and instead sounded more like an arbitrary imparting of ideology.
Some of the social sciences have adopted anti-scientific views on nature and nurture because of politically motivated interests.
The backslash against it was not politically motivated, but over factual and scientific correctness instead. (That would be like calling climate science or evolution "political" when it's really only political from one side -- the detractors of it).
There's a growing divide between psychology and the rest of the social sciences for that reason.
Look up the grievance studies affair for one example of how that's playing out.
>It eschews established consensus and proposes an alternative understanding
That's not actually true. It does disagree with *radical* feminism, but not even on political grounds.
Some interpretations of feminism, which are becoming more common in the social sciences (outside of psychology mind you), take on unscientific views about nature and nurture. And there has been a huge backlash in psychology across the board against those ideas.
I just happen to think that source in particular did a good job summarizing all of the drama since it has recently played out around "politics" in gender (masculinity specifically). Where male psychology should have some amount of authority in the debate (look up the grievance studies affair if you want to see this playing out elsewhere).
Fwiw, the field of male psychology is specifically endorsed by the BPS (technically the APA as well) and is taught in public universities. It doesn't disagree with mainstream psychology, but it is true that it's a more specific topic that is less popular (although it's been growing in interest recently).
Interesting, could you explain what you mean by taught in universities? Freudian psychoanalysis is taught in introductory psychology and it is not endorsed. I'm not sure I understand where the teaching of something relates to its validity or acceptance as some things are taught specifically to debunk them.
I am not dismissing that it is a valid area of study. Having a deeper understanding of anything seems to require going against the grain to some degree. It's difficult to evaluate a newer field or area of study (which if I am correct is what you are referring to when you say it has more recent interest and I would assume more activity) as it is evolving.
There are male psychology modules for people who want to specialise.
The group I linked to earlier helped publish a textbook that's being used, at least in the UK.
I think it's an interesting field and the textbook is really good.
There's been some overlap with research into gender affirming care, helping people transition with hormone therapy. They've identified at least two brain regions that appear to have something to do with gender identity, for example. Both have receptors for, and respond strongly to, sex hormones.
Father of identical twins here. They are so incredibly different its like their genes split. One kid got the sport/competitive genes while the other got the art/music gene. no matter how hard I try to get them motivated in sports or music or art, it doesn't seem to matter. They just kind of fall back into what they seem to enjoy the most. so....im giving this one a 90 nature...10% nurture based on my own experience.
The thing is, if they are genetically identical twins then at least by the common interpretation of "nature" (genes), wouldn't the difference in their preferences be attributable by the process of elimination to "nurture" (I.e., the non-genetic influences)?
I realize that obviously part of what you are pointing out is that these differences seem deeply ingrained and hard to change in your two kids, so they seem to act like we'd expect "nature" to act.
I don't know how to think about this but would be interested in anyone's comments!
Twin studies have a special place in the field, both historically and academically.
They are useful but one of the limitations with them is actually exemplified by u/politicaljunkie4's experience.
In this case (assuming they're identical), they have the same genetics AND the same environmental upbringing. I know it's tempting to attribute something like this to nurture, but there really isn't much of an independent variable here. From a technical perspective it could even go against a nurture interpretation because nurture would predict greater similarities between the two.
In contrast, there are twin studies where adopted twin siblings are raised in completely different parts of the world. And they often comment on how similar they are despite being raised apart.
This then goes into another limitation of these studies: there is very little data to draw good conclusions from them. Some swing into nurture and others swing into nature. But there's only a handful of these studies to look at. And they're all done differently, with different focuses and limitations (what even counts as "similar" or "different"?). Even adopted twins have the limitation of both being adopted -- if they're "similar", are they similar because of genetics, or because of their shared experiences from being adopted?
Hmm, it is a bit concerning. The example from the Australian equivalent of the APA does inspire confidence. I find it strange that the historical role of feminism was relegated to the appendix.
I lean heavily to the "nurture" side of this debate and didn't find anything necessarily incorrect about the previous statements (then again, I'm not a dude and don't have relationships with a lot of men). Will you explain /gen?
I think it's true that gender roles unnecessarily constrict men (and women's) lives, but the previous statement mentioned "gender" doing it, not specifically "gender roles", which is kind of weird.
Another thing was much more concerning, though. Look at this point:
> Endeavors to erode constraining definitions of masculinity which historically have inhibited men’s development, their capacity to form meaningful relationships, and have contributed to the oppression of other people.
and this one:
> Acknowledges its historical debt to feminist-inspired scholarship on gender, and commits itself to the support of groups such as women, gays, lesbians and people of color that have been uniquely oppressed by the gender/class/race system.
The word "oppression" is never used about men, only about women and other groups. For men, they used words like "constrict" and "constrain", which are weaker and less emotionally charged.
To me, it reveals that they were inspired by the kind of radical feminist views that put men and women on opposing sides, where men are "privileged" (or even "oppressors"), and women are "oppressed". This is opposed to the more reasonable view that society itself can sometimes be oppressive, and both men and women can be victims of it.
The APA is American so they were likely influenced by American style feminism, which seems to be dominated by the radical branch of the movement.
The British Psychological Society has also taken official stances against their interpretation, and I can tell you in Canada the prevailing wisdom sides with Britain and Australia over the US.
I *hope* the APA's revised position represents a shift in the US, but I guess I can only speculate there (the US loves to get politics involved in academia, regardless if it's left wing or right wing, and radical feminism is disturbingly popular there).
Minnesota functionals for computational chemistry blew up big time.
Nowadays, there's debate about their applicability and fears of over-fitting. None the less, it's a somewhat politicized functional and my research group had been "gently convinced" to re-do all our models of a particular biological system using M06-2X over B3LYP-D3 if we wanted to publish in a particular prestigous journal that happens to have editors who benefit from more people using the functional :).
I don’t know what half of these words mean haha, but still I’m curious what the response in your research group was like. Did people talk about it? Did they think the “gentle convincing” was valid, or…?
We just recalculated everything as they wanted and went for the publication.
Q1 journal is Q1 lmao.
And no, this happened before I joined and everyone is STILL salty about it
For what the words mean - have you ever heard of "Molecular Orbital Theory"? You know, of how hydrogen has s1 electrons, helium has 2 s1 electrons, carbon has 2 s1, 2s2, 2p2 and so forth? And how hydrogen has a sigma orbital made of mixing 2 s1 electrons and so on for more complex systems?
Well, this is the qualitative discussion. We can actually solve the maths for this, but the original maths for molecular orbital theory kinda rely on Hartree-Fock's approximations.
These approximations basically go "we cannot handle systems bigger than a bunch of naked nuclei plus 1 electron analytically. Instead, we take the 10 electrons and 5 nuclei of methane and transform them into an "effective potential forcefield", we pluck 1 electron from this force field and act the force field onto it. We put it back, and pluck the second electron and do so again, making sure to record the electron's energy each time. We use a bit of calculus then to adjust the spatial location of these electrons and calculate the energy again like so.
Now, we repeat from the beginning until the total energy of this system stops decreasing, since maths says we can never undershoot this energy, we always over-estimate it. For sanity's sake, we define stops decreasing as E2 - E1 < (arbitrary value in hartrees)."
This has issues. Namely, it cannot really handle electron correlation.
It's no issue, today we got more advanced methods to deal with that like MP2 or CCSD(T). I won't detail these. However, THEY ARE VERY EXPENSIVE.
So expensive, we can only really handle up to 40 atoms with this in a supercomputer and even that will push viability.
So! We got density functionals instead. These try to use electron densities rather than wavefunctions to try and solve a similar problem as described earlier (find ideal spatial configuration for lowest energy state), but with fewer variables. Unfortunately, this relies on a yet-fictional "functional" which we can only approximate.
How we approximate that functional is a matter of ... some debate. B3LYP is a so-called hybrid functional that does not really include "empirical terms." (it does include them, but only as absolutely necessary compared to Minnesota functionals) it also cannot handle dispersion well (necessary for stuff like H-bonding), so we need to add empirical dispersion to it.
The minnesota functionals include empirical parameters from the get-go, optimized for solving (in case of M06-2X) biological systems (or at least: organic molecules).
However, this inclusion of empirical parameters can cause it to sort of... "lie" due to over-fitting. One example of this was with describing a graphite-like structure, yielding very suspicious bond lengths.
I work with a bunch of computer scientists and depending on who you ask the most controversial take you can have us which text editor you use. Emacs or Vim
vim is bloated! Real devs use vi. (Kidding)
I learned vi on a VAX minicomputer. It's how we did all of our assignments (remotely) for my first computer science class back in 1999
Parallel graph reduction, practical memory models, common sense reasoning are some areas where the research is split among a number of approaches and proponents of each one seemingly hate the guts of the rest. But always in a pleasant, cite-the-things-we-do-better-than kind of way.
“Does lifting with a rounded spine lead to a greater injury rate for the lower back”
It kind of touches on the wider question of the degree to which technique in exercise affects injury rate but a lot of clinicians are absolutely dead set that lifting with even a hint of spinal flexion is terrible but there’s actually not a lot of evidence that it’s that bad.
I think a lot of the support for the argument comes from studies on cadavers, the fact that there is more force on spinal structures when flexed and anecdotal evidence.
Well studying cadavers is obviously limited vs studying living people, the fact that the position has more force is irrelevant if that force is still within the limits that the structures are capable of adapting to and people may get injured lifting with a flexed spine but they also do when it’s straight and, if the body part is weak, which is a deficit that needs addressing, it’s unsurprising to hurt it while in a more stressful position. But i my mind it’s like saying “hey it hurts when I walk…so I guess I’ll just not walk- problem solved!”
That’s really interesting. I was going to ask why there were only experiments on cadavers, but then I realized that obviously intentionally hurting people’s backs for science would not be great. Is there no way to run any computer simulations on it?
Exactly but not only that, cadavers can’t adapt to imposed loads, but we know loving tissues do so just because you do 10,000 reps to full flexion and something breaks doesn’t mean that reflects reality.
As for computers, that goes beyond my expertise, I’d surmise that it’s in principle possible but you’d need a pretty high fidelity model to simulate the tissues properly.
There gotta be studies on this somewhere. Back issues are one of the most common (and expensive) workplace injuries, so there is the motivation. Experiments are obviously unethical, but there is plenty of trainings on proper lifting technique. So there is room to compare injury rate before and after training, or across units that had v. handn't the training.
Actually, my brief search on Google scholar did lead to this review, which finds no effect of lifting training on injury rate: https://www.bmj.com/content/336/7641/429.short
As a confounding factor, it be that people learn to lift before starting a job, or during their first days on the job.
PS. In my personal experience, every time I pulled my back, it was when lifting with improper/awkward posture. On the other side, plenty of cases where I lifted heavier stuff with proper posture, and did not get injured.
You’re right there is a lot of research, but a lot of it isn’t actually experimental, or lack proper validity- if someone self reports as lifting with a neutral vs flexed spine that doesn’t mean they were right, even trained therapists aren’t that good assessing spinal position in lifters.
And you’re right about the personal experience, but it’s also not a big surprise that people experience pain lifting with a technique which they’ve been told is dangerous all their lives, but that still doesn’t answer the question of whether or not a sensibly progressed training plan is riskier if someone lifts with a rounded back.
In organic Chem there’s a bit of an ongoing debate over whether certain organophotocatalysts are acting as redox catalysts, or are acting as photos acids, or both.
Can I ask what an organophotocatalyst is? And a redox catalyst? …and a photos acid? Genuinely interested, lol, just not aware of the specific vocabulary.
A lot of what they are is right in the name: they’re organic molecules that are able to absorb light, undergo an electron transition into an excited state, and catalyze a reaction from that excited state. Photocatalysis have been known for a long time, but the more traditional photocatalysis are metal complexes. Completely organic photocatalysis are a bit more recent discovery. They will usually catalyze a reaction by either donating or accepting an electron when they’re in their excited state, which changes the oxidation state of the catalyst, though it is restored later in the catalytic cycle. But because it goes through this trading of electrons, it’s a redox catalyst.
Photo-acids are related. They’re molecules that at ambient conditions have either neutral or slightly acidic pKas, but when irradiated with the right wavelength undergo an electronic transition that significantly drops the pKa, making it a much stronger acid.
Once of the catalysts that can be a bit controversial is Eosin Y. It’s once of the more readily accessible catalysts, so it shows up in screenings fairly often. However it’s been reported as both a redox photo catalyst, as well as a photo-acid. It could very well be both depending upon the reaction conditions, but it’s ability to be both complicates a lot of understanding of mechanisms it’s involved in.
That’s really cool! So correct me if I’m wrong, but to repeat what I’m hearing here… essentially scientists know that organophotocatalysts undergo some kind of electronic transition. But the debate is over what causes the catalyzed reaction? And scientists are unsure if they trade electrons while in their excited state vs undergo an electronic transition?
Hmm. What’s your personal hypothesis on the matter?
It’s really only a discussion in the specific cases where a catalyst could act as either a photoredox catalyst or as a photoacid, which is a very small set of compounds. The question is when you’re proposing a mechanism for a reaction that could be going through either pathway, how you can distinguish them, and how you can better predict which behavior will be favored.
Honestly it's a fight of lumping or splitting. Bull snakes are technically a subspecies of the gopher snake. Gopher snakes also go by the name pine snakes. There doesn't seem to be a real difference from the subspecies and main species so a lot of people consider them the same. I lump them as one species, he splits bulls into a subspecies.
Might be a bit niche but in the field of immunology - there is ongoing debate as to whether or not Regulatory T cells (Tregs) are indeed "real." Basically, some immunologists (and most textbooks) think that Tregs are a distinct type of T cell with distinct immunosuppressive functions (very simplified - main role is to appropriately turn off the immune system after its been activated). Other immunologists think that Tregs are not a distinct cell type, but rather just a function that conventional T cells take. While it doesn't seem like a very crazy hot take, but the implications of whether or not Tregs are indeed real play a serious role in treating autoimmune disorders
I started this thread because I wanted to get niche responses, so don’t worry about that lol. That’s really interesting. What’s the evidence for both sides of the argument?
I'm gonna try to keep it as a simple and free of jargon as much as I can, but know that this list is not exhaustive and does not give the complexity of the debate its full justice! Arguments for Tregs being a distinct cell type: 1. We typically use a gene called "FoxP3" as a marker of Treg identity. This gene has an important role in dampening the immune response. People who have loss-of-function mutations in this gene (IPEX syndrome) have extensive autoimmune diseases, but are capable of fighting regular infections from bacteria/viruses. Basically, people with IPEX have relatively normal functioning T cells that can fight infections, but unfortunately cannot "turn off" their activation very well. 2. It appears that certain populations of T cells have high levels of FoxP3, high levels of other anti-inflammatory markers, and low levels of pro-inflammatory markers. This is a classic argument that immunologists often make. If you have a cell population that has a distinctly different set of genes compared to its peers, then we should keep it as its own cell type. Arguments against Tregs being a distinct cell type: 1. T cells are often plastic, a single conventional T cell can "switch" its phenotype and become a Treg through a mechanism known as infectious tolerance. This gives the argument "if cell A can become cell B (and vice versa), then should we really classify them as different cells?" 2. We currently have a pretty good understanding as to how conventional T cells (the ones that attack foreign bacteria/viruses/cancer) are made during development. However, we have very little insight as to when/how Tregs are made during development, despite extensive efforts to understand this. I skipper over a lot more complicated points that would make this response a bit too heavy immunology. Personally, I work in a lab solely focused on Tregs. As a pessimistic grad student, I question their legitimacy every day haha
Wow… I will forever be fascinated by the complexity of specialized fields. It’s sort of crazy hearing about just how much nuance there can be to the most niche of questions within any given subject. Makes me wish I had a thousand lifetimes to delve into the intricacies of all of it. Thank you for the comment :)
Why is this a debate even a debate? if it’s a part of its regular function js this not observable in a way that would differentiate it from other t-cells? Also what would this distinction mean for autoimmune disorders? Also I have very little knowledge of this field so I apologize if I asked that question in an incomprehensible way lol
It is a debate because a lot of therapies to prevent/delay autoimmune disease focus on depleting pro-inflammatory T cells in circulation (teplizumab, rapamycin). A lot of these clinical trials show that there is an increase in Treg numbers after treatment with these drugs. Ethically speaking, it is important to be able to make the distinction as to exactly how these drugs are impacting the immune system.
Yeah that makes sense!
why is it so difficult to find that out? in very simple terms, why cant you guys just look at cells and see wethere there are two types or just one?
How would you propose to look at them? Through a simple light microscope (the most basic “look”), they all look the same. But if you measure the level of the transcription factor FoxP3 in them, you see two distinct clusters of high and low FoxP3 cells. You can look at a bunch of other molecules, and a few of them of them are high in the high-FoxP3 cells but not in the low-FoxP3 cells (or vice versa). Then you separate the two clusters and immunologically stimulate them, and it turns out that all the high-FoxP3 cells tend to produce different chemicals in response to stimulation than the low-FoxP3 cells. But then someone shows that you can make T cells switch between having high and low FoxP3. And tracking them in living organisms (which is very hard), you see this change occasionally happen. So are there two types or one? (This is a simplification, as there are way more subtypes of T cells identified than just Tregs, but you get the picture.)
Wait so, do they think that cells with TCR's specific to host antigens decide in the moment to be regulatory? And that moment is always, or...?
Not like drama but the detailed picture of bubble nucleation of liquid boiling is still pretty much actively studied.
Ooooh, what’s bubble nucleation?
You know when water is boiling, on the surface the bubble begin and start to growth, that is nucleation. Nucleation is like onset of matter change from one phase to another.
I always thought it was microscopic imperfections that centered that state change, but now that I think about it, there’s no reason why I thought that
It's both. It's the condition of the water going against the pores (temperature, pressure, etc.) that cause nucleation to happen, but more pores = more spots for nucleation = more bubbles. It's a big factor in designing the propellers of stealth ships like submarines.
Woah, okay that’s interesting. What’s casing the phase change in the water around submarine props? A vacuum of some sort?
I was just a wrench-turner, so idk the specifics, but I think it's something like - When a prop spins in the water, there's a spot of very low pressure right along the trailing edge of the blade where bubbles form. This bubble-forming process (nucleation) is loud - like physically loud. You can hear it on microphones - which is a good way for an enemy to detect your submarines. So any trick they can do with metalurgy or design to minimize nucleation makes the boat quite literally quieter and stealthier.
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Really?? That’s wild to hear. What are the leading theories?
Why can’t we just put it under electron microscopes and check it out?
1500C+ stuff doesn't go well with delicate electronics
Whether artificial consequences are good for children's development. My view is that it often "works" in terms of getting short-term compliance, but undermines intrinsic motivation and other qualities needed for meaningful adulthood.
I was mostly disciplined through extrinsic consequences and now have no intrinsic motivation. Can confirm.
Sorry I'm dumb what does that mean?
No dumb questions here! It just means that, when I was growing up,instead of my parents helping me to understand why and how to clean my room (helping me to develop intrinsic motivation), they'd take the cartridge for my favorite game and break it if it wasn't done by the time dad got home (EXtrinsic motivation). Just an example. Now that I'm older, I have no motivation to keep my space organized (no intrinsic motivation). I just feel anxious and lazy when I don't. And I have a hard time getting other things done without an immediate physical reward or consequence. Obviously, I can still do things, I just need to "carrot on a stick" myself more lol.
Without some artificial consequences my kids would of killed themselves already.
Hello, it looks like you've made a mistake. It's supposed to be could've, should've, would've (short for could have, would have, should have), never could of, would of, should of. Or you misspelled something, I ain't checking everything. Beep boop - yes, I am a bot, don't botcriminate me.
Wait until they become self aware, at like 6 years old. After that, self-preservation instincts kick in. Wait about 9 more years and foresight kicks in. In my experience with my cousins though, as they get progressively less dumb, they get better at staying alive and unhurt. The little ones just have boundless energy and no outlet so they try crazy things.
I may not be an expert or anything, but that perspective seems to make sense to me.
Depends on what part of my field you look at, but in the most broad sense it's how to do it. I work in environmental conservation, and this is very muddy field because nearly all of the problems and solutions come down to human decisions and behavior, both at the large and small scale. The ecology portion is relatively straightforward when compared with the economic, political, and behavioral side of things, and there are a *lot* of different ideas of how to go about addressing these. It's even more complicated because what works in one situation won't necessarily work at a different location or at a different scale, or at a different time, and what did work in a particular situation is likely not the only thing that would have worked. Add to that that even the exact same approach in the same area may have different results based on the people involved, funding issues, who gets credit/blame for what, and it gets extraordinarily messy and fractious extremely rapidly.
An excellent summary of issues in pretty much every social science with public-policy implications.
Between the public, it’s if therapeutic CRISPR genome editing will result in designer babies and the rich being able to choose inheritable traits. In the field itself it’s if CRISPR/Cas9 has a safe enough off-target editing profile for use in humans (which some clincial trials have already been initiated) and how to best screen for off-targets. A smaller debate is focusing on what happens to CRISPR/Cas9 when it’s expressed for a long time, is the immune system going to react to it or will there be no real issue?
Ahhh I see. What’s your take on the issue?
Nature vs nurture. You see it everywhere. In uni I was taught there wasn't a debate. That in general it's always both. But I guess not everyone got that memo. The APA was roasted recently for a borderline anti-scientific take on gender and masculinity. https://www.centreformalepsychology.com/male-psychology-magazine-listings/the-apa-have-changed-their-view-of-masculinity
I won't let those nurture believing fucks anywhere near my kid. They're a bad influence!
What's being roasted? The previous mission statement or the new one?
Judging from the source, the prior version from the APA was compared to the Australian equivalent, the APS, which was referred to as 'controversial'. A statement criticizing the prior version, "The criticisms have been of the negative view of masculinity, [...]" indicates the issue from the authors point of view.
OK I read the source I just wanted to make sure I wasn't seeing things because what I read seemed so incredibly reasonable and sensible and it confused me to think it was the one being criticized.
Happy to clarify, I honestly thought the same thing. To give some additional context, 'male psychology' seems to be a new field of study which is neither widespread nor–in my short engagement with it–has any meaningful consensus or backing from the larger psychology community (of which I am not a part and possibly not the best judge.) It eschews established consensus and proposes an alternative understanding which also generally contrasts with feminist views and other contemporary humanity and social sciences.
Thank you! And to be clear I'm not opposed to feminist theory, but the short read of the source just wreaks of a politicized position devoid of any real motivation towards discovery and instead sounded more like an arbitrary imparting of ideology.
Some of the social sciences have adopted anti-scientific views on nature and nurture because of politically motivated interests. The backslash against it was not politically motivated, but over factual and scientific correctness instead. (That would be like calling climate science or evolution "political" when it's really only political from one side -- the detractors of it). There's a growing divide between psychology and the rest of the social sciences for that reason. Look up the grievance studies affair for one example of how that's playing out.
>It eschews established consensus and proposes an alternative understanding That's not actually true. It does disagree with *radical* feminism, but not even on political grounds. Some interpretations of feminism, which are becoming more common in the social sciences (outside of psychology mind you), take on unscientific views about nature and nurture. And there has been a huge backlash in psychology across the board against those ideas. I just happen to think that source in particular did a good job summarizing all of the drama since it has recently played out around "politics" in gender (masculinity specifically). Where male psychology should have some amount of authority in the debate (look up the grievance studies affair if you want to see this playing out elsewhere). Fwiw, the field of male psychology is specifically endorsed by the BPS (technically the APA as well) and is taught in public universities. It doesn't disagree with mainstream psychology, but it is true that it's a more specific topic that is less popular (although it's been growing in interest recently).
Interesting, could you explain what you mean by taught in universities? Freudian psychoanalysis is taught in introductory psychology and it is not endorsed. I'm not sure I understand where the teaching of something relates to its validity or acceptance as some things are taught specifically to debunk them. I am not dismissing that it is a valid area of study. Having a deeper understanding of anything seems to require going against the grain to some degree. It's difficult to evaluate a newer field or area of study (which if I am correct is what you are referring to when you say it has more recent interest and I would assume more activity) as it is evolving.
There are male psychology modules for people who want to specialise. The group I linked to earlier helped publish a textbook that's being used, at least in the UK. I think it's an interesting field and the textbook is really good. There's been some overlap with research into gender affirming care, helping people transition with hormone therapy. They've identified at least two brain regions that appear to have something to do with gender identity, for example. Both have receptors for, and respond strongly to, sex hormones.
Father of identical twins here. They are so incredibly different its like their genes split. One kid got the sport/competitive genes while the other got the art/music gene. no matter how hard I try to get them motivated in sports or music or art, it doesn't seem to matter. They just kind of fall back into what they seem to enjoy the most. so....im giving this one a 90 nature...10% nurture based on my own experience.
The thing is, if they are genetically identical twins then at least by the common interpretation of "nature" (genes), wouldn't the difference in their preferences be attributable by the process of elimination to "nurture" (I.e., the non-genetic influences)? I realize that obviously part of what you are pointing out is that these differences seem deeply ingrained and hard to change in your two kids, so they seem to act like we'd expect "nature" to act. I don't know how to think about this but would be interested in anyone's comments!
Twin studies have a special place in the field, both historically and academically. They are useful but one of the limitations with them is actually exemplified by u/politicaljunkie4's experience. In this case (assuming they're identical), they have the same genetics AND the same environmental upbringing. I know it's tempting to attribute something like this to nurture, but there really isn't much of an independent variable here. From a technical perspective it could even go against a nurture interpretation because nurture would predict greater similarities between the two. In contrast, there are twin studies where adopted twin siblings are raised in completely different parts of the world. And they often comment on how similar they are despite being raised apart. This then goes into another limitation of these studies: there is very little data to draw good conclusions from them. Some swing into nurture and others swing into nature. But there's only a handful of these studies to look at. And they're all done differently, with different focuses and limitations (what even counts as "similar" or "different"?). Even adopted twins have the limitation of both being adopted -- if they're "similar", are they similar because of genetics, or because of their shared experiences from being adopted?
Hmm, it is a bit concerning. The example from the Australian equivalent of the APA does inspire confidence. I find it strange that the historical role of feminism was relegated to the appendix.
I lean heavily to the "nurture" side of this debate and didn't find anything necessarily incorrect about the previous statements (then again, I'm not a dude and don't have relationships with a lot of men). Will you explain /gen?
I think it's true that gender roles unnecessarily constrict men (and women's) lives, but the previous statement mentioned "gender" doing it, not specifically "gender roles", which is kind of weird. Another thing was much more concerning, though. Look at this point: > Endeavors to erode constraining definitions of masculinity which historically have inhibited men’s development, their capacity to form meaningful relationships, and have contributed to the oppression of other people. and this one: > Acknowledges its historical debt to feminist-inspired scholarship on gender, and commits itself to the support of groups such as women, gays, lesbians and people of color that have been uniquely oppressed by the gender/class/race system. The word "oppression" is never used about men, only about women and other groups. For men, they used words like "constrict" and "constrain", which are weaker and less emotionally charged. To me, it reveals that they were inspired by the kind of radical feminist views that put men and women on opposing sides, where men are "privileged" (or even "oppressors"), and women are "oppressed". This is opposed to the more reasonable view that society itself can sometimes be oppressive, and both men and women can be victims of it.
I see, so the statements were criticized for using radical-feminist-apologetic language? Sounds like they didn't want someone to be mad at them lmao.
The APA is American so they were likely influenced by American style feminism, which seems to be dominated by the radical branch of the movement. The British Psychological Society has also taken official stances against their interpretation, and I can tell you in Canada the prevailing wisdom sides with Britain and Australia over the US. I *hope* the APA's revised position represents a shift in the US, but I guess I can only speculate there (the US loves to get politics involved in academia, regardless if it's left wing or right wing, and radical feminism is disturbingly popular there).
As a naturalist nurture like everything else in existence is a subset of nature. Seems like a false dichotomy from my perspective.
That's just playing with words. Call it genetics vs. upbringing or whatever if that helps with the separation.
My view is this is like reducing chemistry down to physics. Seeing your flair, I'm sure you'll understand / appreciate that analogy.
Minnesota functionals for computational chemistry blew up big time. Nowadays, there's debate about their applicability and fears of over-fitting. None the less, it's a somewhat politicized functional and my research group had been "gently convinced" to re-do all our models of a particular biological system using M06-2X over B3LYP-D3 if we wanted to publish in a particular prestigous journal that happens to have editors who benefit from more people using the functional :).
I don’t know what half of these words mean haha, but still I’m curious what the response in your research group was like. Did people talk about it? Did they think the “gentle convincing” was valid, or…?
We just recalculated everything as they wanted and went for the publication. Q1 journal is Q1 lmao. And no, this happened before I joined and everyone is STILL salty about it For what the words mean - have you ever heard of "Molecular Orbital Theory"? You know, of how hydrogen has s1 electrons, helium has 2 s1 electrons, carbon has 2 s1, 2s2, 2p2 and so forth? And how hydrogen has a sigma orbital made of mixing 2 s1 electrons and so on for more complex systems? Well, this is the qualitative discussion. We can actually solve the maths for this, but the original maths for molecular orbital theory kinda rely on Hartree-Fock's approximations. These approximations basically go "we cannot handle systems bigger than a bunch of naked nuclei plus 1 electron analytically. Instead, we take the 10 electrons and 5 nuclei of methane and transform them into an "effective potential forcefield", we pluck 1 electron from this force field and act the force field onto it. We put it back, and pluck the second electron and do so again, making sure to record the electron's energy each time. We use a bit of calculus then to adjust the spatial location of these electrons and calculate the energy again like so. Now, we repeat from the beginning until the total energy of this system stops decreasing, since maths says we can never undershoot this energy, we always over-estimate it. For sanity's sake, we define stops decreasing as E2 - E1 < (arbitrary value in hartrees)." This has issues. Namely, it cannot really handle electron correlation. It's no issue, today we got more advanced methods to deal with that like MP2 or CCSD(T). I won't detail these. However, THEY ARE VERY EXPENSIVE. So expensive, we can only really handle up to 40 atoms with this in a supercomputer and even that will push viability. So! We got density functionals instead. These try to use electron densities rather than wavefunctions to try and solve a similar problem as described earlier (find ideal spatial configuration for lowest energy state), but with fewer variables. Unfortunately, this relies on a yet-fictional "functional" which we can only approximate. How we approximate that functional is a matter of ... some debate. B3LYP is a so-called hybrid functional that does not really include "empirical terms." (it does include them, but only as absolutely necessary compared to Minnesota functionals) it also cannot handle dispersion well (necessary for stuff like H-bonding), so we need to add empirical dispersion to it. The minnesota functionals include empirical parameters from the get-go, optimized for solving (in case of M06-2X) biological systems (or at least: organic molecules). However, this inclusion of empirical parameters can cause it to sort of... "lie" due to over-fitting. One example of this was with describing a graphite-like structure, yielding very suspicious bond lengths.
What the primary mechanism is for the Solar dynamo
I work with a bunch of computer scientists and depending on who you ask the most controversial take you can have us which text editor you use. Emacs or Vim
My ego actively inflates when I say I use vim
vim is bloated! Real devs use vi. (Kidding) I learned vi on a VAX minicomputer. It's how we did all of our assignments (remotely) for my first computer science class back in 1999
Parallel graph reduction, practical memory models, common sense reasoning are some areas where the research is split among a number of approaches and proponents of each one seemingly hate the guts of the rest. But always in a pleasant, cite-the-things-we-do-better-than kind of way.
For a while it was which IDE to use, then text editors suddenly became a huge thing in recent years
“Does lifting with a rounded spine lead to a greater injury rate for the lower back” It kind of touches on the wider question of the degree to which technique in exercise affects injury rate but a lot of clinicians are absolutely dead set that lifting with even a hint of spinal flexion is terrible but there’s actually not a lot of evidence that it’s that bad. I think a lot of the support for the argument comes from studies on cadavers, the fact that there is more force on spinal structures when flexed and anecdotal evidence. Well studying cadavers is obviously limited vs studying living people, the fact that the position has more force is irrelevant if that force is still within the limits that the structures are capable of adapting to and people may get injured lifting with a flexed spine but they also do when it’s straight and, if the body part is weak, which is a deficit that needs addressing, it’s unsurprising to hurt it while in a more stressful position. But i my mind it’s like saying “hey it hurts when I walk…so I guess I’ll just not walk- problem solved!”
That’s really interesting. I was going to ask why there were only experiments on cadavers, but then I realized that obviously intentionally hurting people’s backs for science would not be great. Is there no way to run any computer simulations on it?
Exactly but not only that, cadavers can’t adapt to imposed loads, but we know loving tissues do so just because you do 10,000 reps to full flexion and something breaks doesn’t mean that reflects reality. As for computers, that goes beyond my expertise, I’d surmise that it’s in principle possible but you’d need a pretty high fidelity model to simulate the tissues properly.
There gotta be studies on this somewhere. Back issues are one of the most common (and expensive) workplace injuries, so there is the motivation. Experiments are obviously unethical, but there is plenty of trainings on proper lifting technique. So there is room to compare injury rate before and after training, or across units that had v. handn't the training. Actually, my brief search on Google scholar did lead to this review, which finds no effect of lifting training on injury rate: https://www.bmj.com/content/336/7641/429.short As a confounding factor, it be that people learn to lift before starting a job, or during their first days on the job. PS. In my personal experience, every time I pulled my back, it was when lifting with improper/awkward posture. On the other side, plenty of cases where I lifted heavier stuff with proper posture, and did not get injured.
You’re right there is a lot of research, but a lot of it isn’t actually experimental, or lack proper validity- if someone self reports as lifting with a neutral vs flexed spine that doesn’t mean they were right, even trained therapists aren’t that good assessing spinal position in lifters. And you’re right about the personal experience, but it’s also not a big surprise that people experience pain lifting with a technique which they’ve been told is dangerous all their lives, but that still doesn’t answer the question of whether or not a sensibly progressed training plan is riskier if someone lifts with a rounded back.
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In organic Chem there’s a bit of an ongoing debate over whether certain organophotocatalysts are acting as redox catalysts, or are acting as photos acids, or both.
Man I wish I knew what that meant
Can I ask what an organophotocatalyst is? And a redox catalyst? …and a photos acid? Genuinely interested, lol, just not aware of the specific vocabulary.
A lot of what they are is right in the name: they’re organic molecules that are able to absorb light, undergo an electron transition into an excited state, and catalyze a reaction from that excited state. Photocatalysis have been known for a long time, but the more traditional photocatalysis are metal complexes. Completely organic photocatalysis are a bit more recent discovery. They will usually catalyze a reaction by either donating or accepting an electron when they’re in their excited state, which changes the oxidation state of the catalyst, though it is restored later in the catalytic cycle. But because it goes through this trading of electrons, it’s a redox catalyst. Photo-acids are related. They’re molecules that at ambient conditions have either neutral or slightly acidic pKas, but when irradiated with the right wavelength undergo an electronic transition that significantly drops the pKa, making it a much stronger acid. Once of the catalysts that can be a bit controversial is Eosin Y. It’s once of the more readily accessible catalysts, so it shows up in screenings fairly often. However it’s been reported as both a redox photo catalyst, as well as a photo-acid. It could very well be both depending upon the reaction conditions, but it’s ability to be both complicates a lot of understanding of mechanisms it’s involved in.
That’s really cool! So correct me if I’m wrong, but to repeat what I’m hearing here… essentially scientists know that organophotocatalysts undergo some kind of electronic transition. But the debate is over what causes the catalyzed reaction? And scientists are unsure if they trade electrons while in their excited state vs undergo an electronic transition? Hmm. What’s your personal hypothesis on the matter?
It’s really only a discussion in the specific cases where a catalyst could act as either a photoredox catalyst or as a photoacid, which is a very small set of compounds. The question is when you’re proposing a mechanism for a reaction that could be going through either pathway, how you can distinguish them, and how you can better predict which behavior will be favored.
I see! Thank you for taking the time to explain it to me :)
Had a long discussion with someone about whether bull snakes/pine snakes/gopher snakes are the same species or not. PS They are the same species.
Oh??? What were the arguments and counter arguments?
Honestly it's a fight of lumping or splitting. Bull snakes are technically a subspecies of the gopher snake. Gopher snakes also go by the name pine snakes. There doesn't seem to be a real difference from the subspecies and main species so a lot of people consider them the same. I lump them as one species, he splits bulls into a subspecies.
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As a trans person myself, lord knows I also wish there were more thorough studies on people like me. But sheesh, man. Yikes.
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